Menu

I broke down at law school this week, I’d let the emotions get on top of me and I hadn’t dealt with them healthily at all. I’ve spent a while feeling fat and overweight and ugly…all those horrible words said to me by others years ago and the horrible words I learnt to value my worth upon.

I couldn’t hold it together and I broke down in the middle of the class. Two of my really good friends came to help put me back together and I told them exactly what’s been going on. The family, the fear of being told I have cervical cancer, the hurt, the financial situation, and I told them I’m recovering from bulimia. That I have purged and I was so ashamed of myself for, in my words, ‘failing’.

So, it’s been a tough one this week but we had a girls night out (with a close male friend too) and it was simply everything I could have wanted. I could feel how much the week had gotten to me though because I was feeling back in a place where I was nervous to go out, struggling to find clothes, hating that girl in the mirror. I was filled with this fear that I’m going to be that fat friend with my other skinny counterparts. That I’d look so fat and ugly in any pictures that surfaced the next day. I could feel that dread burning. The desire to be thin rising yet again.

The night before I tried on my outfit and hated the way I looked so before going out I tried something different. I didn’t want that fear to be there when I went out. I didn’t want the demon to stop me having fun. So I stood in front of the mirror and I took a deep breath in and I smiled at myself. I thought about how much fun I knew I was going to have. I thought about how much me and E had been planning this night and how excited I genuinely was. I thought about how much I wanted to dance with someone who’s become one of my closest friends, to dance without a care in the world. A night where boys were not on the menu!

Smiling seemed to make me smile even more.

And I felt the smile glowing. I felt my confidence starting to grow. I laughed at some of the antics from the week before and at the thought of only god knows what was going to happen later! I started to smile at how much my friends cared when they saw me break down. I started to remember that there are people who think I’m awesome and, if I’m honest, I do think I’m pretty awesome too.

I was smiling simply because thinking of my friends, my excitement, even those damn sexy shoes I was going to wear made me happy! I was smiling because I knew exactly what outfit I was going to choose and although I had started the evening so scared that I was going to be fat, when I went back to the mirror I loved that girl staring back at me. I loved the curls in her hair, that smile and her dimples. I loved how happy she was.

I loved me.

Just the way I was.

The way I am.

And I realised I could care less about people who made me feel fat and ugly all those years ago because all that matters are my friends who made me smile again. My friends who picked me up in that corridor when I could barely stand. My friends who danced with me all night long. My friends are beautiful people. And you know what? So am I.